smoothed down her soiled, ruined clothes. Then the pictures that covered the rock wall caught her attention, the paintings that had been nothing but darker smudges in the dark night when they’d arrived here.
She’d heard of them when she’d been asking around for information on the island, trying to figure out whether it would be right for this project, but she’d had no idea what they depicted. She’d expected horses and buffalos like other nonhomicidal cavemen left all over Europe. She blanched now as she looked at scenes of wholesale murder. Blood splashed everywhere, necks cut, bellies opened. Shocked, she snatched her gaze away.
Good thing she hadn’t seen the paintings the night before. They would have given her nightmares.
She stumbled away from the images, heading for the beach. The gear she’d put together, with professional help, included a number of toothbrushes and plenty of toothpaste. And breakfast. Most importantly, coffee. She’d have her first cup here, then another cup when they were back in the palace. They made the most amazing cappuccinos there, the frothy milk dusted with cinnamon.
She was one hundred percent certain that the boat would come for them today. The ladies had been angry. They’d made their point. The rescue team had to be on their way, if not already here.
But when she came out of the grove, she found the beach empty. No boat. No prince. And more alarmingly, no gear.
She swirled around. Maybe the boat had come and gone already. Was Lazlo mad enough at her to leave her like this?
“Your Highness?”
No response came, save the slapping of the waves.
“Your Highness?” she shouted more loudly as a twinge of panic squeezed her chest.
He couldn’t just leave her. He wouldn’t, she thought, openmouthed with shock, still scanning the empty beach. He was a gentleman.
In most situations.
But he did seem to have developed some sort of unreasonable dislike for her. Crazy, really, when one considered that she was here to help him. She was instrumental for his future happiness. That he wouldn’t see that was most frustrating.
She was close to making him see reason, though. She was pretty sure. The two weeks with those ladies on this island would have done it. Once she got back to the palace, she needed to come up with another plan, and quickly.
She looked toward the mainland. The sunrise over the endless blue of the ocean filled the sky with pink. The scene was beautiful enough to take her breath away, but after a few moments her instincts prickled. Something didn’t feel right. There was something …sinister in the air.
She shook her head. She thought that just because the prince was missing. Or maybe because she’d seen those dreadful pictures.
She ignored her prickling senses, although she’d always been proud of her keen intuition, a must in her line of work, a strong family trait. Having excellent intuition was essential in matching up couples.
Except, she’d never felt that sense of rightness when she’d considered a candidate for the prince. Not even with the three women she’d invited to the island, if she were to be honest, and the present moment seemed like the perfect time to face certain truths. She didn’t feel that certain zing. Didn’t see that image of the young couple leaving the church and rice flying. Didn’t hear the proverbial wedding bells ring. Maybe that had been the problem to begin with.
Every time she’d looked at a woman and thought of her with the prince, the image brought only one thought to her mind: wrong. And she didn’t have all that much time to keep looking.
She picked up a chunk of driftwood by her feet, walked to get another. Even a couple of larger pieces had washed onto the shore overnight. She could use smoke to signal for help. Not that she had any matches. Those were in the gear, which was presumably with the prince. Still, there was that Boy Scout thing of making a bow with a string and rubbing things against each other. She’d seen that once on TV. But before she could bring up in her mind’s eye exactly how that was done, she saw a man bobbing in the water a few hundred feet from shore. He hadn’t been there a moment before.
Then he was close enough for her to recognize Prince Lazlo. Relief flooded her. He was swimming for shore, pulling something with him. A green bag, dripping with water, she realized, when he was close enough to stand up and start walking.
Naked!
Her dreams rushed back. Her eyes went wide. Her throat constricted. Her heart put on a drum festival in the middle of her chest, the beat growing faster and faster, not slowing until he was out of the water enough so she could see that he was still wearing his underwear. Phew. Royal-blue boxer briefs.
Thank God for small mercies.
Not that the rest of his nakedness wasn’t distracting enough. His upper torso was all lean muscles, drops of seawater running down his tanned skin. The rising sun was behind him, outlining his perfect shape.
Then her gaze dropped to the scars on his left leg.
She bit her lip. The skin was pulled together and a shade darker than the rest, white stripes going through the angry red here and there. He’d gotten trapped in a wreck at a racetrack crash and had been burned a few years back, an accident he so downplayed that, before now, she hadn’t even been aware of the extent of his injuries. From what she was seeing now, he must have suffered horribly. That he was even walking had to be a miracle.
His stunning scars didn’t detract anything from his absolute masculine beauty. If anything, they gave him an edge that she imagined drew women even more. His physique drew her, for love’s sake, and he was the last man on earth she would have ever been seriously interested in.
The first rule of matchmaking was: Do not get involved with a client under any circumstances.
He pulled his left hand through his dark hair to get it out of his eyes, shaking the bag with his other hand to dislodge a long strand of seaweed. His breathing was labored, as if he’d been swimming for a long time.
“What are you doing?” Had he tried to swim off the island with some of their supplies? That made no sense whatsoever.
“Saving the remains of our gear.”
Her feet rooted to the spot. For a second, she couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. She couldn’t really understand. “But—”
“The storm last night whipped up the waves. They ran farther up the beach than usual.” He came over and lowered the bag to the ground at his feet.
“It’s all gone?” She stared at him, still barely comprehending.
He nodded.
Disaster. Absolute disaster was all she could think.
“Can you go back for the rest?” She wasn’t the best of swimmers.
He dropped to the sand, panting, stretching his muscular legs in front of him. “I’ve been at it for the last two hours. Everything else must have been carried far out to sea.”
Her legs wouldn’t hold her up. She sank down across the bag from him.
He
